Olynthos was one of several towns founded by the Euboian city Chalkis in
the three-fingered peninsula in southern Macedonia that became known as
the Chalkidike. In the early years of the Peloponnesian War several of the
cities in the Chalkidike formed the Chalikidian League, which was based
in Olynthos and which issued its own federal coinage. The coinage of the
League began c. 432 B.C., but it was only c. 420 B.C. that its most well-known
coins, the tetradrachms, appeared. On the obverse was the patron deity of
the League, Apollo, the major deity of its mother city, Chalkis, and on
the reverse one of his major attributes, the lyre. The coins can be dated
by stylistic changes in the head of Apollo and, in many cases, by magistrates'
names on the reverses.

The tetradrachms continued as an important regular series until the coinage
of the League ended with the rise of Philip II of Macedon, who completely
destroyed Olynthos and dissolved the League in 348 B.C. Philip, however,
acknowledged the importance of the coins for the area when he adopted the
League's main coin type, the head of Apollo, for his own gold coins.